The Mystery of Ryehurn Manor

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 918, 11 March 1930, Page 5

The Mystery of Ryehurn Manor

By

JOHN LAURENCE

Author of “The Sign of the Double Cross Inn,” etc.

CHAPTER XXXVIII. NEWS FROM RYE “’And what is that little gew-gaw?” asked Sir Arthur, looking at it and passing it over to the superintendent. ‘‘Been despoiling some typist’s neck?” “That,” said Vidler, ‘‘is the clasp from Mrs. Lee’s pearl necklace.” "Dramatic announcement by wellknown detective,” boomed Markham. “And the pearls, laddie?” “II I had them I don’t know that I should cast them before you on the table,” said Vidler, sarcastically. ‘‘But I haven’t got them, and I don’t know where they are.” “Where did you find this?” asked the Commissioner. “In a drawer in Miss Sunderland’s dressing-table.” Quickly he outlined the results of his investigations, while Harding puffed away at his pipe in stony silence. Once he saw the superintendent stroke his beard thoughtfully and glance keenly at him from under his shaggy eyebrows, and Harding felt himself getting hot and uncomfortable under the scrutiny. But Markham made no actual comment. “Miss Sunderland seems to be getting herself into a bit of a mess,” remarked the Commissioner. “I think it looks worse than it actually is,” replied Vidler, and Harding gave him a grateful look. He had half expected the Commissioner to say that it was time Sheila was arrested. The telephone bell rang, and Sir Arthur handed the instrument across the table to Vidler. “Trunk call from Rye,” he announced. “Things seem to happen down there even if you aren’t on the spot ” Vidler replaced the receiver with a puzzled frown when he had finished speaking. “Well, I'm damned!” he exploded. “If that doesn't take the Eccles cake!” “The boy has heard nad news.” observed the superintendent. “Buck up, D.V.! What is it?” “Those flying wires have been taken away,” said the inspector, turning to Harding. ‘‘Some wretched souvenir hunter or—” He broke off and stared at the wall ahead of him. He appeared completely lost in thought, and Harding took the opportunity to explain to the other two what had happened to his machine. “Got any suspicions, D.V.?” asked Sir Arthur. “Yes.”

Vidler answered briskly, but he made no attempt to say in what direction his suspicions lay. Nor, to the surprise of Harding, did the other two press him. “According to Harding,” explained the inspector, those two flying wires providid definite evidence that it was not an accident, but deliberate.” “WHY DON’T YOU ARREST THORNTON. “I thought you said two policemen were left on guard?” asked the superintendent. “So they were, but the fools thought it wasn’t necessary to keep a close watch all through the night on the sands,” said Vidler, bitterly. “They took from 1 o’clock till 5 off, on the assumption there was no one about. ’ “A souvenir hunter wouldn’t have chosen that time to thieve,” said Markham, in decided tones. “And if he did he wouldn’t have chosen just the two wires on the whole machine which mattered. That settles it was deliberate, You and Miss Sunderland have had a very lucky escape.” Harding nodded and clenched his fists angrily. “Why don’t you arrest Thornton and have done with R?" he demanded. “If you don't he’ll murder one of us yet, as he murdered Simmonds.” “He doesn’t know one end of an airplane from the other,” said Vidler quietly. “Now if you had said Lee I’d have understood you. Lee knows exactly what to do.” “Lee wasn’t there,” retorted Harding sharply. “And even if he was he didn’t kill Simmonds, and therefore he has no motive in killing me or you. He was in Hastings that night at a function of some kind. Thornton was in town, in the house. You’ve proved that.” “I was only making a suggestion,” said Vidler, amiably. “I may be wrong, but to arrest Thornton now would be to spoil everything. If you feel that way, Harding, why not stay in town?” "And leave Sheila —Miss Sunderland down there alone with him?” demanded Harding. “You’ll be arresting her next.” “I have more cause to do that than ! to arrest Thornton,” replied Vidler, in even tones. “Come now, you must admit I’ve been pretty lenient in that direction. Markham would have her torn to pieces by now to get the truth.” The superintendent sat back and chuckled at the bewildered look on Harding's fact. The latter could not understand the attitude of these three

men. On the one hand they refused to arrest the one man against whom all the evidence seemed to be steadily accumulating, and on the other they appeared to ignore the mystifying actions of Sheila.

“Leave it to us, Harding,” said the Commissioner. “We are here to get at the truth. . It seems hidden pretty deep down at the moment, but we’H dig it out in the long run, never fear. I don t think any of us are quite clear yet. Suppose we have Jennings in? He’ll think we’ve forgotten him.” “I’m sorry,” apologised Harding. “The whole thing seems a fearful muddle sometimes, and I go off the deep end when I think of what happened before those parachutes opened.” Sir Arthur nodded sympathetically and pressed the bell on his table. “We are making allowances for that.” JENNINGS REPORTS Jennings entered the room with a smirk on his face. He was evidently well pleased with himself. The Commissioner motioned him t.o a chair, and he sat down on the edge of it, awkward and self-conscious. “Tell your story from the beginning in your own way, Jennings.” The man-servant coughed deprecatingly as he placed his bowler hat en the floor by his feet. “Acting on instructions, Sir Arthur,” he rolled his tongue round the title—“l made up to Miss Jessie Harmon, Miss de Hava’s maid.” He looked at Harding. “I showed your letter to the inspector,” said his master, “so you can carry on from there.” “She was a bit offish the second night,” continued the man-servant. An’ I thought as ’ow she’d spotted me like. But she warmed up a bit after we’d ’ad a bite at the Corner House. They were playing some of ’er favourite music, which was, you might say, lucky for me, sir. “Afterwards she wouldn’t go to the pictures. “ ‘Show me where you master works,’ she says. “That nearly flummoxed me until I remembered that I knew a man in Hatton Garden who’d done a bit of valuing through me and told me to come along any time anybody I worked for wanted to sell anything. “ ‘He ain’t there now,’ I says—‘he lives out at Streatham —but I can show you his office.’ “ ‘That’ll do,’ she says. “And maybe I’ll give his lordship a surprise tomorrow. Miss de Hava has got some jewellery she might like to sell.’ “So I takes her along to Hatton Garden and I points out the name of Mr. Karlhen. I’d told her the name on the way down in the bus, and lucky he was still there, brassplate an’ all. “She was all over me then, and says ’ow lucky it was that she’d met me, and ’ow Providence always worked for His own ends. “ ‘You meet me tomorrow,’ she says, ‘at half-past eleven outside here,’ meaning Hatton Garden. ‘I told me lady as j’ou was in the jewellery line. She’s got a couple of pearls she’d like valued.’ “So I met her this morning.” “She brought the pearls with her?” Jennings nodded in reply to the inspector’s eager question. “Loose in a box they were, an’ I takes them in.” He paused and washed his, hands with invisible soap, as though at a loss how to proceed. CHAPTER XXXIX. THE SEARCH WARRANT “What did Karlhen say when you showed him those pearls?” asked the inspector. “He asks me what the game was, an’ says they were artificial and not worth ’is while,” replied Jennings. “He told you the pearls were artificial?” Vidler leant forward as he spoke, rubbing something out of the corner! of his eye.

“Yes, sir. You could ’ave knocked me down with a feather, in a manner of speaking. I was never no more surprised in my life. ‘lt ain’t no game/ I says. ‘I was getting them valued for a lady friend of mine who thought they was worth a tidy bit.’ ‘A tidy bit/ he says, ‘why, they ain’t worth nothing; leastways, you could buy a hundred of them for a couple of one-pound notes/ ” “What did Miss Harmon say when you told her?” asked Vidler. “She was proper wild, an’ says I was swinging it on her. ‘All right,’ I says, /you go and ask Mr. Karlhen if you feel that way / about it. He made me look a proper fool, I can tell you.’ She argued for some time about it, i and then she sees I was annoyed about it and came round again. ‘I know me lady will be upset/ she says. ‘She had a string of them given to her by an admirer and he told her it was worth thousands. My word, she’ll make it ’ot for him when she next sees him. They ain't been getting on too well together lately, and this will put the tin hat on it. I wouldn’t be in his shoes for a king’s ransom/ “ ‘Who is he?’ I says, casual like. ‘And what’s it got to do with you?’ she says, so I changes the subject. ‘Perhaps some of the pearls are valuable/ I says. ‘Don’t you believe it/ she says. ‘I ought to have thought it. He’s as mean as they make ’em.’ I fixed up a date with ’er for this evening to hear what her lady says, if you agree, that is to say, sir.” He looked at Sir Arthur as he spoke, and the Commissioner in turn looked at Vidler with raised eyebrows. “I’ll go and see the lady myself, before that event,” he said grimly. “This looks to me a clear case. Can I have a search warrant and a man?” “I’ll get it sworn out now.” The Commissioner spoke into the telephone and gave the necessary instructions. “If it’s convenient to you, Harding, perhaps you’ll let Jennings on,” suggested Vidler. “I agree. I suppose you won’t be going down to Winchelsea again tonight?” “No. But there’s nothing to prevent you from going. Take the car with you. You might find it useful. And keep your eyes open.” “Not much fear of me shutting- them now.” returned Harding with a laugh. “I have had all the lessons I want today.” “And now,” said Markham briskly, as Harding and Jennings went out, “to our muttons. What do you make of it, D.V.?” “Hash!” replied the inspector. “I thought I’d got on the right lines until Jennings sprang that story. In fact, I thought I should be able to sum up and begin to take action. Now I shall have to begin all over again, and I’m beginning with Thornton’s little pal.” “You believe he sent the pearls?” “I believe he sent some pearls,” replied Vidler. “Not Mrs. Lee’s obviously, unless ” “Unless what, V.D.?” prompted the Commissioner, as the inspector stopped short. j “It may seem a bit wild to suggest } it,” continued Vidler slowly. “But [ supposing Mrs. Lee’s pearls aren’t worth anything? Supposing Lee was bluffing about their value every time? He may have been hard up some time and have substituted a good imitation. It takes an expert to distinguish them nowadays. Naturally he wouldn’t let on about it. You remember he wasn’t very worried about j the pearls. Nothing like so excited as l should have been if I’d lost them.” “You'll never get twenty thousand to buy them in the first place,” boomed Markham. “As a police officer, you’re too squeamish.” “You’re not exactly rich yourself—being married,” retorted Vidler. “To carry on. Supposing Thornton pinched them and posted them under the impression they were real. They wouldn’t have arrived when we first searched her ladyship’s flat. Frankly,

the post didn’t occur to me at the time. That would clear up the puz2;le of the pearls.” “My dear Sherlock,” said the superintendent, “what about that little souvenir?” He pointed to the gold clasp on the ta.ble, the clasp shaped like a snake’s head and tail. “The pearls are with Miss de Hava and the clasp with Miss Sunderland. How does that fit In?” “Hash was what • I called it,” sa,id Vidler. “And hash is what It is. But what’s been put in the stew-pot and who’s put It In, I don’t know.” “Don’t let us give you indigestion,” said Markham, cheerily, as he watched the gloomy look on Vidler’s face deepening. “I can see you’re getting a germ of an idea, and perhaps it will flourish and grow into a healthy plant, though the ground’s a bit arid.” Vidler cheered uni/ immediately. When the superintendent jested it showed that he was content with the way things were progressing, that he still had confidence in his subordinate. Actualiy, he had always, in any case, but the latter had curious fits occasionally of not believing in himself. Fortunately they never -asted very long and the superintendent generally knew how to bring him out of them. “Arid or not it will grow all right, John,” he retorted. “When I’ve finished with the lady at Highgate there’ll be a surprise for someone, or my name’s not Vidler.” “That’s the way to talk. Who are you going to take with you?” “Higgins,” replied Vidler. “Not much will ,get by him.” The Commissioner nodded his approval. “He’s pretty good,” he agreed. “Here’s your warrant.” On their way to Highgate in the police-car Vidler explained the general position to his subordinate, Lilian de Hava received the two men with no sign on her face of what she might be thinking. “I think Scotland Yard Is behaving very foolisly, Mr. Vidler,” she saidlightly, when the inspector displayed his search warrant. “You’ve searched my flat once and found nothing. What do you expect to find a second time?” Vidler was blunt. He had no patience with the gold-digging type Lilian de Hava represented. “A few pearls. We have reason to believe that a necklace of pearls has been sent to you within the last two days by Mr. Thornton.” He was watching her keenly, and saw that his shot had gone home. She was plainly disturbed by his statement, though he marvelled at the control she kept over herself. “You are very clever, Mr. Vidler.” she acknowledged. “Though I do not know how you found out. I shouldn’t have thought Mr. Thornton would have told you of the trick he played on me.” “You’ve got the pearls, then?” asked the inspector. He did not ask her what the trick was which Thornton had played. He had only one thought in his mind—to obtain the pearls. “Yes, I’ve got them, if that’s all you’ve come for.” “It is all I came for.” There was no attempt on the part at Vidler to conceal the triumph in

his tones, and Lilian de Hava turned her flashing dark eyes on him. He was surprised at the passionate anger in them. “Then I hope you’ll be satisfied, because I’m not,” she said, sharply, rising and crossing to a bureau. “Mr. Thornton may think I’m a fool; but he’s very much mistaken.” “Thornton’s finished here,” reflected the inspector. “It looks to me that Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned, which is all to the good as far as I am concerned.” He was keyed up in anticipation. When a woman lost her temper there was no saying what she would do, save that she would give herself away pretty thoroughly in the process. She crossed from the bureau and flung a small cardboard box on the table with a sneer on her face. “There are the pearls dear Mr. Thornton gave me as a parting gift to keep me quiet.” Vidler reached across without any comment, and lifted the lid. From the box he drew a long string of pearls and gave a little gasp of surprise as he saw the clasp. It was identical with ■the one he had found in the drawer of Sheila’s dressing-table, a snake’s head with open mouth into which its tail fitted. •‘l’m glad you have saved us the trouble of making a search,” he said “So Mr. Thornton sent them to you, eh? By post, I suppose?” “Yes, by post. He hadn’t the cour-

age to bring them himself. He might have thought 1 should have seen through his trick.” “What trick?” Vidler wasn’t goilng to acknowledge yet he knew the pearls were Imitation. “Isn’t it obvious? He’s fooled you nicely, Mr. Vidler, just as he fooled me at first. But I’ve finished with him. He can hang as far as 1 care!” Vidler w-as surrpi,sed at the fierceness of her anger, tor the complete change over in her attitude. He did not want to take a false step. He was evidently assuming that he had knowledge of the trick Thornton had played her. Did she think, he wondered, that Thornton had revealed where the pearls were, thinking the chase was too hot, so that she should get the blame? He must tread warily. “I’m afraid. Mr. Thornton has got himself into an awkward corner,” he said cautiously. “He told me they were worth twenty thousand pounds,” she _ried furiously. "Probably the real ones are, but he hadn’t the pluck to take them. Twenty thousand pence would buy fifty dud strings.” Vidler examined the rope of pearls. Not by any sign did he betray the exultation he was feeling. He could have sworn the pearls he held were the Identical ones which Lee had shown him. But he was no judge of pearls. “They make artificial pearls so well nowadays,” he said, “that I am not surprised you were deceived. Only a jeweller, and an expert at that, can i make sure.” (To be Continued Tomorrow.)